Insights from the American Customer Satisfaction Index

Consumers Say Credit Unions Offer Better Rates Than Banks

For a second year, credit union members feel that they receive better service and more competitive interest rates than consumers who have accounts or personal loans through retail banks. ACSI’s annual study on financial services shows banks down 2.6% for customer satisfaction to score 76 on a 100-point scale. Meanwhile, credit unions—with membership now surpassing 100 million—are second best among all ACSI industries with a high benchmark of 85.

ACSI’s findings coincide with record-high fees for checking accounts, but banks are actually collecting fewer fees than ever before. Consumers are becoming more adept at avoiding extra charges, but another strategy may be avoiding the big banks altogether. While the structure of credit unions allows for fewer fees, CUs still provide superior service in nearly every area, from transaction speed to Web banking.

Indeed, consumers looking for free checking are much more likely to find it at a credit union. For interest rate competitiveness, customers put CUs ahead of banks by a wide margin of 13 points. The only areas where banks outpace credit unions are number and location of ATMs and branches. While this is not surprising given the more localized nature of credit unions, this may be an area that the industry could focus on improving, especially as membership continues to swell.